5 Tips for New Comic Collectors
5 tips for comic collectors
Remember to always collect what you love!
If you are new to collecting comics or just looking for useful tips to help hone your collecting skills this article is for you. This list was curated based on a mix of personal experience, word of mouth from others, and some internet research. It will cover ways to think about and approach collecting as well as ways to prolong the life of your books.
Protect Your Comics
The first thing you should be doing to protect your comics is buying bags and boards if what you are buying doesn't already come in them. They help keep books mostly protected from harm, anyone wanting to store comics for any period of time should be using them. Bags protect the books from things such as dust, water, and some physical damage. Boards keep the books straight and typically extend past the edges of the books to ensure the corners are also protected. The reason bags mostly protect books and not completely is they are not hard enough to protect from punctures or crushing, and they are still somewhat vulnerable to their environment around them. Many people who stored books in their garages thought bags and boards would keep them safe. Unfortunately if you live in a humid environment, moisture followed by mold can get into your books even inside of boxes and bags. Therefore, it is advised comics be stored indoors in a climate controlled, cool, dark, dry place. They should also ideally get some air every so often and be re-bagged and boarded every 5-10 years if you are storing books for that long.
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2. Make Sure You Have the Space
Anyone getting interested in collecting comics should know that it is a hobby that takes up space, and proper storage is very important as books accumulate faster than you think they will. Having a plan on how much you can store and how to properly store it will help out tremendously. Collectibles like comics obviously do hold some resale value and selling off comics you have already read can be a great option to keep the size of your collection manageable. Unfortunately, most modern books do not hold much value like older books do. If you are someone at all hoping to make your money back on books you have read, you should plan on holding them for multiple years as their value is not likely to be worth much any time soon. Even then, most books will have no gain in value and only a few of the most popular or low print books are going to net any gain without being graded and receiving higher scores. Most shops will offer you about twenty to twenty five cents a book if you are trying to resell your modern books. If you are expecting to get any more than that, plan for storage.
In addition to making sure you have the space to store comics it is important to be organized with your collection. Whether you collect to read or just to own, having some type of system in place will make things so much easier on you to find books from storage if you need to find a particular book for any reason. Storing them alphabetically by title and divided by publisher seems to be the most popular option; and storing everything in order by the date each book was published regardless of character or publisher has also been recommended before. Just pick whatever system you feel works best for you, this will ensure books stay easy to find and as safe as they can be.
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3. Budgeting
Having a budget for any kind of collecting is very important. If you are reading this, you are most-likely interested in comics in some way. Whatever your reason, it could be collecting, reading, or both, making sure we budget responsibly to meet our wants is crucial to maintaining this hobby without hurting ourselves financially and ensuring you can keep buying comics for a long time. Too often people will get into a new hobby and blow a ton of money immersing themselves into that hobby only to have to sell all of it shortly after to recoup the losses. Going in knowing what you want and how much you can spend can help keep you from bottoming out like this. Everyone’s financial situation is different and trying to match the numbers of books you see other people reading or collecting might not be possible for you and knowing that before you begin will save you a lot of pain and money.
4. Be Open to Trying New Things
This is a great tip for old and new collectors. It is very easy to go into collecting starting with a certain character you want to read or collect and that is a great way to start collecting but branching out and trying new things will not only introduce you to new characters but also new publishers, new writers, and new artists you would not have seen if you hadn't tried something new. For older collectors it's also easy to get into a rut of only collecting what you know you like, there are so many people that only collect DC or only collect Marvel. While I understand brand loyalty and supporting something you love, you are really just cutting yourself off from something new to potentially love. Obviously people have different tastes and not all hype on new releases will be warranted but sometimes taking a recommendation from someone else could lead to you finding a new favorite series or character.
5. Have Fun and Do What You Want
Lastly, just have fun and buy what you like. Just because someone else is recommending something and you should be open to those ideas, does not mean you have to buy every book someone else says is good. Knowing what you like and what you can fit into your budget is key. With so many comic book Youtuber’s and other people hyping up books to try and sell them online it can feel like you need to buy everything to stay up to date with the comic world. Trying to compete with or keep up with anyone else in collecting or trying to spec on books to resell can be a futile task that will have most people broke in months, especially if you are new to the hobby. It is said all the time in all forms of collecting, just buy what you like. Just because everyone loves a certain character or artist doesn’t mean you also need to like them. If you are buying books just for the covers, or purchasing books of characters you don’t enjoy reading about in hopes of one day selling them for profit, then you will quickly run out of storage. However, if you are only buying books you genuinely love and appreciate, it will be easier on your storage space and finances, and you end up stuck only with things you like!
The comic book community and collecting in general was greatly changed during 2020 with huge numbers of people getting back into collecting or just starting out brand new in the years that have followed. With so many new collectors out there trying to figure out the hobby a new list of tips and warnings can always be helpful. Hopefully everyone finds at least something useful from this article and if there is anything that I missed or tips anyone wants to add please do so in the comments below.
